Choosing Names For The Fourth Time

No, I'm not pregnant!!!

Jeff and I need your help!

Though Jeff's primary occupation throughout our exceedingly blissful marriage has been isowean farming, home construction and finishing runs in his blood.  Before we were married, and for a time after, he was a full-time, self-employed framer. He framed up his first house by himself when he was 19. We have built one spec house and one custom home together, and have really enjoyed the process.  Over the past few years, with the, er, "diminishing" hog industry slowly nudging us towards other vocations, it has felt pretty natural to move back into the home-construction industry.  He has spent the last few years installing tile, laminate, hardwood, vinyl and carpet in homes from here to Timbucktu.

For the past few months, we have been throwing around different business names for the work Jeff does.  We are looking for a name that could encompass more than just flooring, but stays in the home contracting line of work. Though we've come up with a whack of names (Cutting Edge, Clean Cut, True North, Core Focus, to name a few), two have stood out as potential winners.

Which leads me to my big question.

Will you help us by voting for your favourite?

Name Option #1:  Frontline
Now, it could be Frontline Homes, Frontline Interiors, or just Frontline, but what do you think about Frontline?

Name Option #2:  Footprint
This name suggests flooring, but because all homes have a footprint (the physical space they take up on the land they're built on), Footprint may also be appropriate for a more all-encompassing home-construction related business.  Hmmmm......

So, these are the two options being looked at right now.  If you think these are laughable, and have a better idea, feel free to leave a comment.  Better to be laughed at now than when we have a  4' x 11' decal on the side of the trailer!

We are asking all who are interested to leave a comment, voting for your favourite name (please be interested!!).  If you select "anonymous" when posting your comment, you can maintain your privacy, if that's important to you.  Thank you for your help in this!  I'm so excited to see what your thoughts are!

At this moment, I am...

happy - with how much accounting-related stuff I got done today. Tax-time is approaching, and it always feels good to kind-of/sort-of/in-a-way be ready for it.

smelling - the lasagne heating up in the oven and the red onion and garlic of the Greek Goddess Salad  I just made (yes, it's really called that).

hearing - the sounds of my kids having their after-school fun - pages turning, paper airplanes going "weeeeee" , marbles rolling across the hard floor, humming, giggling.

waiting - for my hubby to walk through the front door.  Since coming back from Australia, the days feel so long without him around. 

grappling - with the idea of change, and realizing that I am more adaptable than I used to be.  I'm, by no means, ready to become a mechanic in Antarctica, but I feel more capable of handling small changes that happen in everyday life. I think.  Just don't test me on that!

wondering - what God's plan is for us, and when He will make it more clear, or if He will always choose to show us just the next step.

pointing and laughing - at every airplane I see flying above.  "Ha ha, I'm not in you - I'm so done with you for now!"  All those poor, dehydrated, recycled-air-breathing passengers!

pushing - the limit on how many days my family can go without having a laundry day.

contemplating - on starting a "1000 Things I'm Grateful For" list.  How long would that take?  I wonder what would it look like?  After listing "health, kids, husband, warm house, and free country", I'd have to get creative.

excited  - about spring, but am doing my best to embrace the last of the cold winter days.

frustrated -  at the sounds of arguing and antagonizing that I'm hearing now.  How did that happen?!  Wasn't I just writing about happy sounds???

It's The End Of The World As I Know It

I can't put it off any longer. 

I've now had one week of excuses for not pulling my weight around here.....I've spent most of that time sleeping at strange hours, eating strange things at strange times (like supper when I wake up in the middle of the night, and breakfast at supper time), playing Sudoku, feeding my family freezer meals that didn't get eaten while I was in Australia, and relying on my generous husband to parent our tribe.  I don't think I've made anything more complicated than toast.  I've done no accounting work, and, for the most part, have avoided housework like Jerry avoids Tom.

But I feel this utopian existance coming to an abrupt halt.

I'm reluctant to replace sleeping in, self-declared PJ days, and late nights by the fire with "to-do" lists, meal planning, and grocery shopping.  But there seems to be no turning this thing around.  Jeff is back to work full-time today, the kids have a 4-day school week, with the day off behind us, and the freezer will soon cease to give up its treasures. I remind myself that it will feel good to get back into the swing of things.  I am, by nature, a do-er.  And, yikes, the life of a mom involves lots of doing! And I really enjoy my life, and all most of its tasks. But in the past three weeks, I have been anything but a do-er.  And, let me assure you, it has been great!  I'm a little hesitant to fall back into my old patterns.  I'm wondering if I could be different.  I'm not sure.  Can a do-er become a part-time doer, with lots of non-doing time?  Does this do-er even want to become less of a do-er?  Is it even realistic?  Does the life of a do-er, or a non-doer look different from the outside?  Or is it more of an internal state of mind?  Is chocolate healthy? Ah, the questions.....

In the meantime, time keeps marching on.  Today, my list includes grocery shopping, watching/volunteering in Mason's class during swimming lessons, making supper, working on some accounting stuff, and two loads of laundry. Plus quality time with Taelyn, which may include reading books, making bookmarks, playing Twister, and getting whooped at The Memory Game.  Nothing over the top, but after three weeks of  "sleep in, go out to eat, watch waves at the beach, sit by a fire, play games", this seems like a bit of a shock.

It reminds me of the Peninsula Hot Springs we visited in Australia.  There were several natural pools of  hot water, and beside one of them was a tiny plunge pool, about six or 7 feet deep, filled with freezing cold water.  The water may not have been any colder than the ocean water we had swam in the day before, but after coming out of the hot pools, entering the plunge pool was, um....something to get used to.

Today, my life feels a bit like a plunge pool.

So, to ease my pathetic, lazy self back into my normal routine, I'm going to make myself a cup of tea.  And maybe, while sipping it, I will google "how to do less and still get everything done", followed by "vacation deals", unabashedly followed by "how to make your own cucumber mud bath with ingredients found in your kitchen".

Capturing Australia on Camera

I'm reporting live from my home office at 3:30am, 27 hours after returning from Australia. Clearly, I am suffering from jetlag and "I-don't-have-any-idea-what-time-zone-I'm-in" syndrome.  Although I'm sure I'll have future (perhaps even coherent!) reflections of my time in Australia, here's few images capturing some moments.

I can't show pictures of Australia without showing some native wildlife.  This particular koala bear was fairly energetic and showed us how it could run up trees in seconds.

I had my first experience on a city train.  As it turns out, it makes me carsick, just like nearly every other form of transportation, but it was another thing to add to my list of experiences.  Bec, Earlene and I took the train to Melbourne for a fun day of shopping and girl time.

I couldn't help but feel I was visiting a food market in Paris with merchandise like this.  My beautiful sister-inlaw, Bec, bought one of these for us to share at the Victoria market in Melbourne.  Fresh bread filled with chocolate chips?  I'm in!

So this is what I'd look like with long, straight hair.

The Australian answer to America's burger and fries .  Every town and city street corner seems to have a bakery selling a huge variety of fresh meat pies and croissants.   Farewell, good intentions and hello to buttery pastry and gooey cheese! 

This was the first time meeting my GORGEOUS nephew.  He is simply so stunningly beautiful, and has such a sweet personality to match.

  

My first official seashell picked up out of the sand along an ocean beach.

I was greeted at the airport with signage and huge hugs by my niece, Piper.  She is six, very soon to be seven, and simply cannot wait for her birthday.  Once she turns seven, she claims she'll be able to go shopping whenever she wants and watch TV without asking her mom and dad.  She has a unique capacity for loving openly and completely and feeling deeply.  At the beginning of our visit, I told her I would probably need lots of kid hugs to alleviate my loneliness for my family.  She took her job seriously and gave me tonnes of hugs and cuddles.  What a sweet girl.

A great memory of Gord in our younger years (some would argue we're still living them, but just hear me out) was hearing him play guitar and sing.  And the guitar seems to continue making an appearance when we see eachother.

Aussie surfers out for a casual, relaxing day of risking their lives battling relentless, dangerous waves and unpredictable riptides.  Maybe that's just my fear talking.  It was my first time watching surfers, and it actually looked like a lot of fun, though I can't see myself ever having the courage to try it.

Piper and Jasper hanging out at Gunnamatta Beach.  Note the two heads in the top right-hand side of the picture.  That's me and Gord wave jumping.  I must admit, though it freaked me out going into the waves, it felt totally exhilirating, and even better when I was back on dry ground.  It's not quite surfing, but it gave this ocean-rookie a rush, nevertheless.

Earlene (left), Bec and I on our last evening together.  I feel so blessed to have these two beautiful, insightful and gracious women in my life.

See these waves?  My goodness, I could watch them all day.  Each one is alive and different from the previous one.  When we were at the beachhouse for three nights, I fell asleep with images of ocean waves in my head.  Pictures simply do not do this amazing force justice.

Sigh.  Other than the fact that I look like I just woke up, this picture, and others like it, remind me how lucky I am to have this guy in my life.  Though he frustrates the pants off me some days, he is fun, tender, compassionate, and generous and I feel so fortunate to have such a good relationship with him.  Saying goodbye to him is never easy.

On that note, I'm going to go to bed now.  My Aussie family is just considering going to bed now, my Canadian friends and family will consider waking up soon, and my body seems to have no idea what just happened.  Good night and good morning!

Cuppas, beach houses and waves - it all sounds good to me!

Before embarking on this journey, I was unsure of my expectations of this adventure.   I wasn't sure if we'd be engaging in the itinerary of a tourist, or if we'd be hanging out with Gord and Bec at their house much of the time.  And, quite honestly, thoughts of leaving my family quickly overshadowed those of my holiday agenda, so I didn't give it too much consideration.  Now that I'm here, however, I've really been enjoying the mix of things we've been doing.  My initial purpose for coming here was to hang out with my brother and his family and experience their lives in a way that's not possible from across the world.  So the time we've spent sharing meals, making apple pie (ok, so Bec made 99% of the pie - all  I did was hold the wax paper in place while she rolled out the dough), and having  "cuppas" (Aussies love their cuppas!!) have been really meaningful for me.  I've enjoyed the conversations that have occurred spontaneously as we hang out in normal, everyday spaces.

That said, we've also done considerable amount of touristy things, as well.  At the time of this posting, I'm sitting in a holiday beach house near Rye, a town right on the ocean.  We went down to an unsupervised, natural beach where the ocean waves were crashing in with amazing force.  Of course, the locals would perhaps describe the waves as normal - same as any other day - but as someone who doesn't see that power everyday, it's spectacular, breathtaking, and dangerous, all at once.  I simply do not tire of watching the waves come in.  As I stood there, with the salty water swirling around my legs,  I was reminded that I had stood in those same waters 10 years ago, and had made a mental resolution that the next time I would see these waters, it would be with Jeff at my side.  Hmmmm....  perhaps that's why I missed him as I stood in that space.

Tomorrow, we intend to spend some time at the swimming beach, and then head over to the other side of the peninsula on a ferry to check out the touristy town on the other side.  We'll look at some shops, and perhaps spend all the money my husband is making, and no doubt have a cuppa or two!!! I'm keenly aware that my time here is half over, so I'm doing my best to stay in the moment and absorb everything this beautiful country has to offer.

G'day, mate!

Our first glimpse of Australia...

Well, we made it.  Our flight to the great Down Under was uneventful, in the sense that we didn't need to use our life jackets or the oxygen masks provided on each of our aircrafts.  It was eventful in the sense that I watched more movies than I have in the last year, traveled further than I have since the last time I was here, and ate meals at strange times (like when we were served chicken and rice dinner at 3:00 in the morning, Canadian time).  A highlight during the flight was being paged twice at the Sydney airport - apparently there were some security issues with a chainsaw we were trying to bring into the country - go figure.

My time here is precious, so I will be spending little of it in front of the computer.  I'm currently missing a great conversation.

It's Time...

My Life Right Now in Numbers

5:00am - The time we received an automated phone call yesterday, telling us our flight to Chicago was cancelled.

70 times 7 - the number of times I tried to give it to God before finally getting up.

1 time - I was assured by the Expedia agent that our flights were not cancelled.

3 websites - I checked (that confirmed that all flights to and from Chicago were cancelled due to bad winter weather) before concluding that the Expedia dude must have missed a memo.

3 itineraries - that we've had for this flight, thus far. 2 days ago, we were flying to Melbourne through Chicago and Los Angeles, yesterday morning, were were flying through Toronto, and as of 7:00 last night, we are flying through Vancouver.  We hope the third one's a keeper.

4 hours - spent on the phone in total, figuring out how we would get from point A to B.

3 kids - who have firmly lodged themselves in my heart, and show no signs of leaving.

2 great sets of grandparents - who will, lovingly, be taking care of our sweet ones, while dad's at work.

1 husband and best friend - who will be orchestrating kid's schedules, and loving the kids double time.

3 hours - till we leave for the airport.

0 things - that NEED to be done on my To-Do List.  Approximately a million that could be done (including helping my hubby paint - yes, as I write this, he is in the process of purchasing our 4th can of paint in 3 days.  Our basement lies in shambles.)

6.5 hours - till lift off!!

5 people - I can't wait to see on the other end!!

1 more day- till I get to see them!!  They are so worth all this effort.

Bedtime Story #1: The Legend of the Secretly Moonlighting Mama

Once upon a time, in a land not so far away, lived a not-so-young, not-so-old girl with beautiful, golden, curly locks of hair.  But, although this story grew out of a comment made by the not-so-young, not-so-old girl with beautiful golden, curly locks of hair, it is really a story of desperation and ultimate triumph.  One day, the girl said to her mama, "Mama, I know you love me, and I know you care about me, so please fix my ski pants with a patch.  There is a hole in the knee, and it makes my legs all wet, and I am going to play outside all day tomorrow.  Please, mama, if you love me, please mend my ski pants."  The mama, touched by her daughter's expression of need, reached out her arms to her daughter, and gently assured her by saying "Of course I love you, and of course I care about you, I will not let you down."  Then she proceeded to promptly forget the whole conversation.

Six hours later, the mother woke up from a gentle night's slumber with a start.  She remembered suddenly her grand declarations made only hours earlier.  After briefly considering suggesting to her daughter that she wrap scarves around her knees, she resigned herself to mending the pants.

While searching for something that could be used as a patch, she spotted an unfortunate pair of hockey goalie knee pads.  She rationalized that they were not being used by anyone, and had been acquired for free, so the loss was negligible, she reasoned.

She proceeded to cut two squares out of the knee pads and sewed them together to make a nice, sturdy patch.  It was after she had finished sewing that she discovered the thread she had been using was not black, but yellow - and not a murky, dark yellow that could be interpretted as, say, black, but a bright you-may-not-love-me-but-you-will-notice-me daffodil yellow.

Not only did this yellow thread highlight all the amateur sewing, it most certainly did not disappear against its black backdrop.

Undaunted, but perhaps slightly afflicted by sleep deprivation, the mama decided to mask the colour in a most clever fashion.

Yes, it was even permanent!  Having had much experience attempting to remove permanent marker from many a fabric, the mother silently rejoiced (for the first time) at having non-washable markers in the house.  Her confidence soared as she covered the unsightly yellow with a more pleasant, discreet plum.

The mama then set to work fastening the patch to the afflicted pant leg. At this point, she began to think about her role as a mama.  She had never requested the position of seamstress, yet here she was, hired for the nightshift, without the ability to be fired.  It seemed that life was altogether unfair.

After 20 minutes of minimal progress and a forefinger painfully red from multiple needle punctures, the mama fiercely determined to herself (for who else would wish to share this moment with her?) that there HAD to be another way.   As if on que, she remembered another clever trick she had employed on numerous occasions.

Yes, Super Glue had been a solution to many problems...fixing toys and sealing children's lips, among others.

Within moments, the triumphant mama had successfully adhered the patch, and proudly hung the ski pants on her daughter's hook in the entrance of their home.  Her fatigued state and desperation prevented her from recognizing how awful it really looked. 

  

In the morning, when the mama saw her project in the light, she immediately offered to buy new ski pants for her daughter.  But the not-so-young, not-so-old girl with beautiful, golden, curly locks of hair, insisted, with all the grace of royalty, that the pants looked great, and she was most pleased.   The mama, weak with relief and exhaustion, sank into a chair and said, "I love you and I care about you, and I tried to not let you down."  The End.

Weather Outlook for Melbourne, Australia

I think I can handle this!

14°C | °F Current: Partly Cloudy Wind: SE at 13 km/h Humidity: 72% Fri 21°C | 13°C Sat 29°C | 19°C Sun 35°C | 19°C Mon 34°C | 21°C

Pantry Mini-Makeover

I'm here to share a small, recent home project with you.  In our kitchen, we have pantry doors that open up to reveal pull-out drawers.  For a long time, I've pondered what to do inside the frame of the door, to either make it more functional, or prettier, or both.  Yes, while some people discover new cures for diseases, and others spend their time working with government intelligence agencies, I think of what material I should use to cover the inside of my cabinet door. Such a diverse world we live in....

First, I considered a wallpaper of sorts - I've seen this done with great success, but I feared that my taste would change, and I'd be stuck (pun intended) with wallpaper that is outdated.  And, besides, I like to change things up in my house more often than some newborns get their diaper changed, so whatever I decided to do, it'd need to be either easily removable, or adaptable. I've also considered narrow metal baskets, but there's really not enough space when the doors are closed.  A couple of weeks ago, I had a moment of decisiveness, and decided we would install cork (you will shortly see that "we" means my dear husband).  With cork, I could easily change up what greeted me each time I opened up the pantry.  Simple! I purchased one linear foot of cork at a local home hardware store.  Later that evening, my dear husband, seeing the cork laying on the counter, offered to help me "install" it.  Within minutes, he had glued the cork, filling out the frame of the door nicely.

Ah, that's better. Thanks, hubs!

This is now where I store my shopping list.  And it leaves plenty of room for small, handcrafted gifts from my sweet kids.  And a card I purchased on Etsy last year that I have no intention of giving away yet.  I have, by no means, attempted to create a stylish display here, but I can totally see myself obsessing about pretty, inspiring stuff to hang on this little board sometime when the mood strikes.  For now, I enjoy the small burst of friendly colour and the warm fuzzy feeling I get when I'm reminded of my kids each time I open this door.

Does anyone else have a special place to store a shopping list? Or are you one of those people who mutters 39 food items under their breath, by memory, while running through the grocery aisles?  Do tell - the rest of us are simply dying to know.

(For those of you super-clever readers who noticed the "before" picture and the "after" picture were not the same door, you busted me!  As I'm really new at this, I'm not good with taking proper "before" pictures yet, so the BEFORE picture was actually the other pantry door and was taken approximately 2 weeks AFTER the after picture.  Just keeping it real, people)

God's Sculptural Art

This is what I saw when I looked outside my window this morning. Though my limited photography skills prevented me from capturing it perfectly, I was amazed at how soft each crystallized flake appeared.  It was like each tree was covered in thousands of downy feathers.  Fortunately, they weren't actually feathers, because can you imagine the mess if a tree would molt like a chicken, and lose all its feathers?  Yikes!  And I thought raking feathers after butchering chickens was lots of work!

Family Binder

I'm so excited to share today's organizing idea with you all. 

We'll start our discussion (or perhaps, more accurately, my monologue!) today with addressing the problem many of us face. Odd, miscellaneous paperwork.  Not stuff that needs to be stored for 7 years, but not junk mail, either. The paperwork may be as different as the people who occupy the home, but I think we can all agree that papers of all shapes and sizes walk in through our front door, taking up residence in our home. I'll share the type of stuff we deal with in our home, and maybe you can adapt the ideas for the paper that takes up prime real estate on your countertop.  Perhaps you have a different system that works well for you, and that's great!  In fact, I'd love to hear about it, and use your input to tweak my system!  Doesn't this sound like fun!?

Here's my scenario....

If our society is going paperless, they must have forgotten to inform my children's school, because our kid's bring home a lot of paperwork.  And, really, I'm grateful for how the school places such a high value on communicating with parents; however, it seems, every other day, someone is coming home with something regarding an upcoming event, a form to sign, a reading log, birthday invitations, newsletters, special day calendars, blah blah blah.  These sneaky little papers, although important, have a way of bullying their way onto a pile on the counter right beside the fruit bowl, maybe together with yesterday's mail. And then there's the schedules for kid's extra-curricular activities, volunteering, church-related activities, and on and on the story goes.  For a system to work well, it needs to be readily accessible, yet out of the way so that spaghetti sauce from last night's supper doesn't splatter all over Hermanda's immunization permission slip.

The solution?

It will require perhaps an hour of your time, at most, a binder (new or otherwise), plastic page protectors, and some subject dividers that have holes that fit into your lovely binder.  It's as simple as that.

Or, if you're like me, you make it complicated by looking for beautiful subject dividers online and in stores, and still end up with a not-so-pretty looking end result.

Before I continue, I need to give credit where credit is due.  Although I've had a binder like this for some time now, just the other day I discovered a blog called  I Heart Organizing, and discovered she had almost the exact same binder!!!   What are the chances!!  Since then, I've seen other bloggers use similar systems, but with file folders instead.  But after reading HER version of the binder, I added some pages to mine....like a babysitter info page, as an example.  If after reading this, you are interested in organizing other parts of your home (like me!), I encourage you to read her very helpful, friendly blog.  She has an insanely organized home, and has so many pretty ways of getting it done.

To create this binder, begin by gathering all these papers you have laying around.  As I said before, gather all the stuff that comes home from school that I mentioned earlier,  the office christmas party invitation (well, ok, if you still have 2010's invite, throw it away!), the Proctologist's pre-op instructions for your upcoming colonoscopy, the Septic Cleaning business card that you want to refer to annually, but is currently hanging on the fridge...you get the idea.

Sort the papers into casual piles.  Keep the piles fairly general for now.  Depending how much your family has going on, you may end up with 3-7 piles. My family doesn't have 576 activities planned each week, so I can get away with the following categories "Phone/Contacts", "School", "Kids", "Mom and Dad", and "Other". 

Once you feel comfortable that the piles are not too general, but allow some flexibility, throw the individual papers into page protectors, one paper per protector.  For example, currently, in my "school" category, I have my children's annual school calendar, each child's monthly classroom calendar, the pizza/hotdog day schedule, a ziploc bag of pizza/hotdog coupons purchased (I buy them in bulk at the beginning of the year, so I can forget about it for a long time), the swimming lesson shedule for my Grade 2er, a letter from the school outlining an upcoming field trip, a school fun day schedule. Because I won't be around on Valentine's day, my children have already addressed the valentine's they'll be handing out to classmates and friends, and we have each of these cards in ziploc bags, ready to be thrown into their backpacks on the day of the exchange.  That's what's in my "school" pile.  Just saying.

Once all the papers are put into page protectors, put them into your handy binder, and separate them with subject dividers.  When the paper becomes obselete - the event has passed, or whatever - simply toss the paper into recycling, shred it and use it to make paper mache elephants with your kids.

Put the binder in a readily accessible spot in your home (not in the same box as 2002's income tax papers, behind the furnace, or at the bottom of your fridge, behind the turnips you bought at the beginning of January when you resolved to try one new vegetable per week).  I have my binder in a drawer in the kitchen island. Right close to all the action.  For those of you who are wondering, I lined my drawer with a sheet of cardstock I purchased at The Scrapbook Cottage. My drawer happens to be so small, that one 12" x 12" paper was more than enough to line it.  It's obviously not essential, but I find that I smile when I open my little drawer and see a smidgen of fun paper peeking through.

A smidgen....that's the operative word here.   My binder actually doesn't fit this drawer as well as my old binder (but the old binder was black, and the graphic pattern on this binder was calling my name).  If you look closely, you'll see there's not a lot of room between the binder and the drawers edge.

About the width of my thumb, to be more precise. My dear kids have actually adapted well, and have diligently learned a special technique of getting the binder out of it's cozy abode.  Bless their hearts.  I'm so fortunate to have sweet kids who are so gracious towards their mother and her zany ideas! I'm not sure what my husband will do if he needs access to this binder. Maybe I'll have to store a small jar of Vaseline nearby so he can grease up his finger before attempting to displace the binder.  No system is perfect, I suppose.  I can accept that.

There are more things I have in my binder, like kid's list of daily/weekly chores, and an extensive phone/contact list of friends, families and business we regularly use, but I think you've all heard enough for one day, non?

How do you store this type of paperwork? Do you have a system that works well for you?  Do you subscribe to the "pile on the counter" approach, and see no need to change it because it works for you?  I'd love to hear your ideas.

In this moment, I am......

Drinking: Green Tea, with no sugar, in my favourite mug.

Listening: to the early morning silence in our home.

Observing: the slight change of colour I see in the sky, as night grudgingly gives way to day.

Enjoying: this song, by Leeland.  It's a song that had to grow on me, but now, I keep hitting repeat on my mp3 player.

Anticipating: a visit on the weekend from dear, out-of-town friends we haven't seen in a very long time.

Wondering: casually, what I'm going to feed the aforementioned dearly beloved.

Absolutely loving:  the warmth that our woodstove brings us during these cold, dark days.  Laundry is folded in front of this fire, countless games of Uno are played here; this is the go-to spot after skating or sledding outside, stress melts away here, prayers are prayed here.

Resolving: to go to bed earlier tonight.

What are you doing right now?

Bright idea

During one of my (many, many, many) visits to the local MCC Thrift Store, I purchased this lamp for $4 (actually, I bought two at the same time, and got a bit of a discount for purchasing in multiples!).  I liked the shape of the lamp base, and knew exactly where it would fit in my home. 

This is the underwhelming before photo (yes, that is a child's painting hung upside down behind the lamp - I think that was my heroic move):

I sprayed it with Krylon Indoor/Outdoor Paint in a Glossy White, being careful to tape the cord and the light socket to avoid overspray.  A minute here, and a minute there, and within an hour, the lamp had found a new home in my living room (with the addition of some lampshades I had purchased earlier).

I guess in all my excitement (because these things do get me very excited!), I didn't take a before picture of the second lamp I bought, but imagine it to look a lot like the first lamp, except with a yellow shade.  Here is the after (please ignore the doily thing that the lamp is resting on - I couldn't resist putting the lamp in place while it was still wet!):

So there you have it.  Decorating on a dime.